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The crunch of metal runners on snow. The thrill of picking up speed, wind in your face. The brief lift as you reach the bottom of the hill, wondering how far you'll make it before you stop. Then the uphill climb to do it all over again.

Sledding!

It's one of the defining rites of childhood. Some digging into The Scranton Times archives took me back to the snow-covered hills of Scranton's past.

At the turn of the 20th century, a favorite sledding spot was Saw Mill Hill. The hill started at Brick Avenue and William Street and continued north, past a bridge that spanned Leggetts Creek, then past a mule barn owned by the Leggetts Creek Coal Co.

The Olive Street Hill was featured in the childhood recollections of a 1967 Scranton Times column by Edward Gerrity. "The most popular hill that stands vividly in our mind," he wrote, "ran more than a mile, from Taylor Avenue in Scranton's Hill Section all the way down to the Lackawanna River where Olive Street joined Carbon Street." Sleigh riding enthusiasts, Mr. Gerrity recalled, came from all over - from East Scranton and Dunmore, from downtown Scranton and Pine Brook, from Sandy Banks and even from the old Diamond Flats to coast down that thriller of a hill.

After school, younger children enjoyed the hill in sections, declining to climb the full distance and coast to the bottom. "But in the evening," Mr. Gerrity wrote, "it was different - the 'big fellows' took over, and they used nothing but sturdy bobsleds that often traveled at almost a mile-a-minute down the lengthy incline." Some of them carried 10 or 12 riders.

There were few automobiles in those days, but the riders took risks that, Mr. Gerrity wrote, "they never seemed to consider." They had to cross two streetcar tracks. They posted lookouts to flag down a streetcar when a bobsled was coming.

By the 1930s, though, the city did consider the risks to children on sleds. On Dec. 1, 1935, Mayor Stanley J. Davis moved to protect children who were sleigh riding "without the benefit of police protection," as The Times reported. He announced his intention to ask city council to request funds for police at coasting zones, as the designated sleigh riding areas were called.

The annual appropriation for coasting zones had been eliminated from the budget several years before. The previous year, 1934, the city partially regulated traffic at thoroughfares that were set aside for sledding. Mr. Davis pointed out that such partial regulation likely left the city liable for any accidents that might occur.

"Because of the question of liability," the mayor said, "there can be no half-way methods adopted. We either must go all the way or furnish no protection at all. Personally, I am in favor of council making an appropriation so that we can return to the old system of posting reserve patrolmen on full-time duty at all coasting zones."

The question of cost came up again the following year. By Jan. 21, 1936, Scranton was on the brink of closing its coasting zones because appropriations had been exhausted. On learning that the money had run out, Mr. Davis immediately contacted Thomas F. Kennedy, Works Progress Administrator for the area, to request that WPA workers whose jobs had been temporarily suspended because of snow, be assigned to replace the police at the coasting zones. Ten zones were in operation. In early February, six more were added, all policed by WPA workers. Hills on Division Street, Pine Street, Prospect Avenue, South Irving, Avenue and Swetland Street were among those designated for sledding.

The days of flagging down streetcars were over. Coasting zones stayed in effect in Scranton through the 1960s. Officials urged parents to make sure their children used them so they could enjoy this seasonal rite safely.

CHERYL A. KASHUBA is a freelance writer specializing in local history. Visit her at scrantonhistory.com.

Contact the writer: localhistory@timesshamrock.com.

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